North Hero Causeway view
— — water on both sides, all the way across.
Not only on a wall.
“The road across to North Hero is a two-lane causeway carrying US Route 2 between the islands of Grand Isle County. Lake Champlain runs east and west of the asphalt, the Green Mountains on one horizon, the Adirondacks on the other. Drivers slow. There is a small drawbridge midway. In late afternoon the water turns the colour of pewter. from the studio
North Hero Causeway view, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
North Hero is one of the four towns that make up the Lake Champlain Islands archipelago in northwestern Vermont, in Grand Isle County. US Route 2 enters the islands from the south at Sand Bar State Park, crosses Grand Isle, and continues onto North Hero by causeway across The Gut, the narrow water between the two islands. The drawbridge at the crossing is operated by the Vermont Agency of Transportation for boat passage. The town sits at low elevation just above lake level. Year-round population is roughly 800.
Lake Champlain runs about 120 miles north to south along the Vermont-New York border and into Quebec, and is the sixth-largest natural freshwater lake in the United States. At the causeway between Grand Isle and North Hero the lake narrows enough to bridge but stays open water on both sides, the broad lake to the west toward the Adirondacks, the inland sea to the east toward the Green Mountains. The water freezes most winters thick enough for bobhouses. In summer it carries the Lake Champlain Ferries, sailboats, and the occasional loon.
The islands sit on a long flat horizon and the light has room to move. Sunrise lifts off the Green Mountains across the eastern channel; sunset drops behind the Adirondacks across the broad lake. Mid-afternoon in summer the water reads silver-blue and the causeway shimmers. The blue hour after sundown lingers longer than on the mainland because nothing tall interrupts it. Photographers know the pull-offs along Route 2 between Knight Point State Park and the drawbridge. The light through October is especially clean.